Demand grows for Jaya's resignation

There is growing demand for the resignation of Tamil Nadu Chief Minister Jayalalitha after the transfer of the 'disproportionate wealth' case against her and others from Chennai to a Special Court in Bangalore by the Supreme Court.

Former Union Finance Minister and now 'Jananayaka Pervai' leader P. Chidambaram yesterday told a press conference that in view of the Supreme Court's remarks against the Tamil Nadu Government, Jayalalithaa should resign. A similar demand was made by Pattali Makkal Katchi chief, Dr Ramadoss.

The originator of the case in 1995, Janata Party President Dr Subramanian Swamy has offered to be the Public Prosecutor when the Special Court is set up in Bangalore and takes up the trial of the case. He told a press conference in Bangalore that he was also a complainant in the matter and possessed "certain hard facts and evidence".

Under the provisions of the Prevention of Corruption Act, a complainant could also function as a Public prosecutor, he said, adding it was now open to the Karnataka Chief Minister, S.M. Krishna to take a decision.

Meanwhile, new details are available here about the Supreme Court order of the transfer.

The main case was that Jayalalithaa and the other accused had accumulated assets of Rs666.5 million, disproportionate to their known sources of income.

The transfer order said "It does appear that the new Public Prosecutor is hand in glove with the accused, thereby creating a reasonable apprehension of likelihood of failure of justice in the minds of the public at large".

The Supreme Court bench also said it was the duty of the public prosecutor to have first strenuously opposed any application for recall of witnesses and in any event to have confronted the witnesses with their statements recorded under Section 161 of the Criminal Procedure Code.

JUSTICE DENIED

The case against Jayalalitha
• In the first case the charge against Chief Minister Jayalalitha and other accused was that they had accumulated Rs666.5 million.

• In the second case Jayalalitha and Dinakaran had been charge-sheeted for allegedly acquiring and possessing "pecuniary resources and property outside India through clandestine transfer of funds".

• By August 2000 some 250 prosecution witnesses had been examined and the first case seemed to be moving towards a conclusion.

• After the AIADMK was returned to power in the May 2001 assembly elections, "the course of justice took a crude and scandalous beating".

• When the trial resumed in 2002, 76 witnesses were recalled for cross-examination. Of these 64 resiled from their previous statements with several of them claiming that they had given statements 'under pressure'.